I Don’t Get It?

I’ve never claimed to be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I’m also not the dullest.  Sometimes, marketing is as much about common sense as it is about creative and analytics.

The first example is a sight named Second Life.  You might remember it as the rage back in the early - mid 2000’s .  You could create an Avatar of your liking, walk around and interact with others in a virtual community atmosphere.  Long story short… a number of tech companies including IBM, Dell, etc. were creating virtual communities where Avatars could interact with the company, it’s representatives and other Avatars.  Although you couldn’t purchase anything, you could walk around and have conversations.

Dell created “Michael Dell’s Dorm Room”… a recreation of where Dell stayed and started the very successful Dell Computers.  Avatars could interact with Dell Avatars, discuss computer options, etc. But they couldn’t purchase items through the store.  I actually went in and try to order a PC, but was told I needed to go to Dell’s website to place my order.

What was being sold on the site were “virtual goods.”  For instance, you could buy virtual clothes or items for your Avatar.

Creating these communities wasn’t cheap… Six figures wasn’t unusual… time on coding, licensing, creative, etc. adds up pretty fast.  Plus, you had to staff your site with individuals to be your Avatar representatives.

Naturally, given publicity around Second Life, a large number of Marketers were pushing for funding to create an HP Second Life Island.  The big question I continued to ask was, “Why?”  The answer was always, because our competition is there.  When I asked the question, “How to we make money using this site?”  No one could answer the question.  Could you place an order?  Nope.  The grand idea was to have seminars on the site.  Really?  We’re going to rely on the site to get the correct people at one of these events?  These people are going to just “show up”… we advertise and they shall come?  That might work… but again, how do we make money?

Long story, short.  We didn’t put the sight up as no one could answer the question.  Perhaps saying “I don’t get it” worked this time.  If you don’t understand it, don’t do it.  It’s simple, don’t invest your Marketing dollars if you don’t understand the payback.  It sounds easy, but how many times do we rubber stamp media plans, creative ideas and the like.  Start taking a deeper look and asking if you get it.  You might be surprised how many things you start to question.

Scott